Tom Matlack believes the ‘cheater news cycle’ cheats us out of more important discussions.
There are two kinds of sexual scandals: those that deal with consensual sex and those that deal with sex that is not consensual. One is newsworthy because it’s a crime and one, frankly, is not. Why is it, then, that spend so much time reporting on consensual sex and under-reporting sexual abuse?
Last week we published the tragic suicide note of Trey Malone, an Amherst College student who was abused and did not receive adequate help. The note, and subsequent controversy around our publishing it, haunted me just as it did when I first read it. As if to bookend the week, on Friday, David Petraeus–who is perhaps the most respected general of our time–resigned as CIA Director for having an affair.
The two events gave me an opportunity to think, and experience first hand, what we talk about when it comes to male sexuality and how we are collectively missing the point.
I don’t mean to be flip, but my first reaction on hearing the story was, in light of Trey Malone who fucking cares about David Petraeus having an affair?
I mean really, people, are we just about done with the headlines about Tiger, Arnold, Clinton and all the rest?
We’ve created this beast which is a supposed “news” infrastructure built around the hunt for the next celebrity bad boy found with his pants around his ankles in the consensual loving embrace with someone he shouldn’t be having sex with based on his marital status.
True love is something that we all aspire to find, I believe. We are hardwired to want love and to be loved. And it’s a difficult thing to do and be. If you are human you know that. We all stumble, fight, and love in the best way we know how. And hopefully we find that one person that we can crawl into bed with and know there is no other who could ever take their place.
Somehow we have gotten into this ground-hog day news cycle of powerful men who have sex outside their marriage as the absolute top story at even the most respected news organizations.
I say: shame on all of us.
Tiger Woods is the best golfer of his generation, perhaps of all time. He cheated like crazy and his wife found out, chasing him around with a golf club. That is sad indeed. Tiger was certainly going to have to pay dearly in his personal life for his lack of fidelity. But he didn’t commit any crime. His transgressions didn’t have anything to do with playing golf.
So under what set of national priorities, does it become imperative for Tiger Woods to hold a huge press conference to admit his infidelities?
In a sense we are culpable in the cheater news cycle. They wouldn’t be holding press conferences to disclose cheaters if we weren’t all watching. It’s up to us to put down the obsession just as much as it incumbent on the supposed hard news outlets to stop playing to the lowest common denominator.
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There is a flip side to the Petraeus story: how much does the personal ethics of a man count towards how we judge him in the public eye?
David Petraeus is perhaps the best-known general of our time. The Iraq War—started based on misinformation about weapons of mass destruction—was an unmitigated disaster when he took over. He was the one who finally figured out that when your goal is to create democracy, as futile as that might be, you can’t just bomb the shit out the people you are trying to help indiscriminately. You actually have to win their hearts and minds. To the extent we had even the appearance of any success in Iraq it was due to his change in strategy and leadership on the ground.
How does his screwing around with his biographer rank in importance to turning a mass U.S. killing field into something that resembled an attempt to lift up a nation from armed conflict? I don’t know. You tell me. On Veteran’s Day we might want to think about his service before humiliating him for consensual sex.
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The other thing that happened this week, of course, is that we re-elected President Obama. The most popular tweet of all time was of him hugging his wife after he won. A viral YouTube video shows him crying while addressing his campaign staff.
Who the heck knows what happens behind closed doors, but our President certainly seems like he is devoted to his wife and kids. He appears to be a good guy in his personal life.
So my question is whether or not that matters? And if so, how much?
I also got myself into trouble leading up to the election by questioning how much impact the election, however it would turn out, would really have on our country given how broken, in my view, the system is in terms of money in politics and how similar Romney and Obama are on foreign policy, among other things.
Shortly after the election, someone posted an image of dead Afghan babies on my Facebook wall. The question raised in the post was whether President Obama would be held accountable for the death of innocent civilian children across the globe at the hands of the U.S. Military.
Just like putting stories of infidelity ahead of criminal acts of rape is missing the point, the question when it comes to Obama and Petraeus isn’t whether or not they love their wives. That’s a private matter.
It’s whether or not they made the right call when ordering the death of thousands of human beings in the name of freedom.
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As the son of Quaker pacifists, I have a strange obsession with war. I want to know what causes us as men to fight. Along with our sexuality it is a defining part of modern manhood that I can never quite understand. But I do try.
Recently I have been reading the book by the Navy Seal who was part of the mission that killed Bin Laden. I also recently re-watched Black Hawk Down, the story of the 1993 ill-fated U.S. action in Somalia.
In both cases, what becomes clear is how little regard our highest trained troops have for our political leadership. They rarely think about the larger significance of their mission. Their loyalty is to the man next to them. No further.
So let’s start telling the truth about war. And about sexual abuse. And stop worrying about how men and women attempt to find love and screw it up over and over again. The scandals do nothing but obfuscate the most important issues of our time.
I’m 53 and, having begun my first committed relationship at 20, have never “cheated” on anyone. Nor has anyone ever “cheated” on me. I’ve never had or wanted a monogamous relationship. I’ve spent the bulk of my life in three long-term relationships, of 14, 7, and (currently) 10 years duration. (They keep dying on me.) Cheating was never possible because cheating requires breaking a promise. Our promises involved loyalty, trust, and respect, none of which in my mind and heart have anything to do with the fool’s gold of sexual exclusivity. I don’t believe any of my relationships have ever… Read more »
We put these generals and military officers on a pedestal and worship them and say they can do no wrong….or just look the other way….the stuff that is happening on the side is not important or harmful….that that silly shenanigans on the side has no consequences….that it is only gonna hurt his wife and his lover (ie., it’s just his women….so what?)….Just ignore it all…it has no ramifications on security or top secrets… If anything, we need to really look at them all the closer and at all the lies and B.S. they put before the American public….why do we… Read more »
These evolutionary explanations are the mother of all retrospective explanations. They take things as (we think) they are, then come up with a way evolution “must have” led to it. Some few hundred years ago, when women were thought to be the more naturally promiscuous sex, they would probably have explained that. Meanwhile there are species where all this is on its head – females massively larger and more aggressive than males, all kinds of mating patterns, and so on. Plus human cultures that are incredibly promiscuous and some that are incredibly prohibitive. “Hypergamy” is a description, not a cause.… Read more »
” hypergamy is a description not a cause” !! I don’t think you understand what an Evolutionary genetic treat means or even how it operates in nature, human or otherwise, although I studied it, I am not only not an expert in it, but even the experts agree that how it express itself in the real world is complicated, nevertheless it is there Sir, make no mistake about it not only is it a fact of life it is actually measurable , not necessarily exact but no difference then statistical analysis of many other things, that never negates the personal… Read more »
@Not buying it:: I have to disagree with the idea that personal choice and agency trumps the controls and hard-wiring of our lizard brains. You know as well as any that morality is fluid depending upon cultural expectations and circumstances. What one culture views as immoral in one place and time changes over time. Is it immoral for a person living in Ohio in 1860 to have harbored fugitive slaves? Doing so was certainly against the laws of the nation and of the Bible at that time. It seems in consistent to suggests that on the macro level the rules… Read more »
@ogwriter
Reality, nature or evolution is more complicated then 2+2=4, Sir.
Personal choice & agency , can trump trump hard wiring as we know it at the same time by asking how can you explain self sacrifice for an idea or a belief in total disregard for personal survival & staying alive which is one of the most basic hard wired drive! !!???
It’s more complicated then just hard wiring, at the same time we know even if millions self sacrificed, the majority of the other millions will not.
@Not buying it: What we are saying in some ways is similar. I agree that hard-wiring is not the only consideration when analyzing human behavior. Certainly, at any given moment one can and does trump the other. Morality, whatever we think that means over the course of history, is informed and often shaped entirely by our wiring. Personal choice has a much better chance of balancing the influences wiring with the morality of the times if one is informed of the power and agency of their wiring.
I agree with you fully , I think we see the same thing we just describing it slightly different, from our point of view, as a matter of fact what you said explains for example way men make more money then women overall! !! It’s not necessarily due to sexism towards women although sexism towards women does exist, I don’t believe 70 cents to the dollar exist because of sexism for the most part, as much as certain people & ideologies do not like to admit the obvious because it’s politically incorrect & doesn’t feel good or sound right.
@Not Buying it: The same can said for the debate surrounding why there aren’t more women in politics. I once asked a gorgeous,independent and fiercely intelligent woman why more women didn’t run for the presidency and she said,” Why be the president when you can marry him?” Her point was, among other things, that a woman can gain the advantages of power without having to make the enemies and make the tough decisions which can isolate one from their pod. Also, the person in leadership must behave in ways that are more masculine without complaint. No one wants to hear… Read more »
Hypergamy is an observed phenomenon. Of course it exists. Saying that it is “genetic” or hardwired is one step further – it’s asserting what caused hypergamy. I’ve never seen anything estimating its heritability, associating it with a genetic locus, or producing/eliminating it with genetic manipulation (if you know otherwise let me know). Since it’s a fact and everything biological was “caused” by evolution, telling a story about how evolution “caused” anything you observe is easy. Proving why evolution could not have come up with exactly the opposite solution (as it often does in different species, read up on hyenas’ social… Read more »
@pat Okay pat let me turn off the back ground noise, Evolution or otherwise & let me simplify the point I am trying to make, deceiving my wife as negatively it might be perceived when you looking at it throw the lenses of morality regardless of whether it’s religious based or even using an atheist’s moral lenses is what it is if you look at it very objectively & with No personal or societal based judgment, a man cheating on his wife for whatever reason Evolutionary or otherwise an act or behavior that relatively a fair number of men (like… Read more »
Correction
I meant likewise men or women.
@ pat
It’s almost absolutely unanimous among Evolutionary psychologist the simple fact that the majority of females in many species are hypergamous, heck it exist in males in some species as pronounsd as human females, the difference is it’s not so pronounced in (male humans) because other traits are more useful.
Some females are less hypergamous then others, but on average it’s a known and acknowledge trait associated with human females worldwide & throw history.
” It’s also beside the ethical point. ( it’s the devil made me do it ) dressed up in old Greek words & scientific lingo.” Morality & it’s limits or boundaries is what we as a society decide what it is, it’s not inherently something that exist without us creating it, just like we invented religion, judo-Christian values that are similar to other morality tenant created by civilization that never came into contact with judo- Christian philosophies therefore I certain aspects of morality as we know it were central for creation of civilization all over the world for example (… Read more »
sorry for any typo errors in my comments folks, I am using a so called smart phone with automatic spilling & writing on top of trying to write before the refreshing software swallows what I wrote, sorry again.
@Pat: For me, simplistic moralizing, based upon a moment in human history, isn’t sufficient enough to provide logical evidence for why people, not just Mr Patraeus and Mrs Broadwell choose to “cheat”. Besides that we have no way of knowing exactly what the conditions of the relationships were between the parties involved. Most are speculating based upon presumptions about the Judeo Christian ethics of those involved. The truth is, according to the latest Kinsey Report,in over 150 countries, infidelity is the number one causation for divorce. How do we know that some women choose men for long term relationships based… Read more »
@Pat: I have not in anyway, at least to my knowledge, inferred or suggested that the individuals involved in this scandal are not responsible for what they did. I am not saying that they shouldn’t be held accountable for their actions and to the people they hurt. I am saying that if we lived in a society that acknowledged that fluidity of human sexuality and that relationships are not always monogamous and that its OK and not immoral to have multiple sex partners there would be less infidelity and unhappiness around sex. In many professions, men are pressured into accepting… Read more »
Double Standard much, the woman in this case, from what I have seen was also married, apparantly she is getting a book deal, doing the talk show circuit, and generally going to make a ton of money. AND BTW, that pretty much wraps up what happens to all the women who have affairs with married men.
Usually the women that have affairs with these type of men are less recongonized so they receive less public scrutiney for their behavior. Although, I’ve heard plenty of nasty comments for the woman in this case, Monica Lewinsky and Tiger Wood’s mistresses. I don’t know if Tiger Wood’s mistresses got book deals. I don’t remember them getting that. There is a double standard that exists regarding powerful men and entitlement to sex though. Sometimes there is even a code of honor among other men to keep these kind of behaviors under the table. Which is why the CIA agents where… Read more »
@ERIN Me cheating on my wife as long as it does not effect the rules of my job (national security, performance of my duties, etc…) shouldn’t be grounds for losing my job or position as long it doesn’t contravene with the rules & laws related to my job or position period, I believe in the case of anybody in the CIA & jobs like it with protocols that prohibit that behavior, they should lose their job man or woman. the point is a man cheating on his wife is no different then a woman cheating on her husband when. she… Read more »
I agree that a man cheating on his wife is no different than a woman cheating on her husband. I also stand by what I said above.
The act of cheating on your mate in itself shouldn’t be grounds for dismissal, this idea that men in power & women who are attracted to them due to hypergamy should be disallowed since it’s morally wrong on any grounds religious or otherwise is foolish, idiotic & based on emotions.
Evolutionary psychology proves for a fact & without a doubt women & men will engage in that behavior at any price due to human Evolutionary predisposition.
@Erin: It depends on the woman and how her behavior, in a given context, is perceived culturally. Madonna, whether one thinks she is current or not, proved my point recently on Ellen DeGeneres Show and in her personal history, as well. She appeared on the show wearing suburban chic dominatrix gear, ( which she told everyone where they could find it online( mainstream com modification of sex,gotta love it!) and in tow she had a clutch of male subs of different races,(mustn’t discriminate when you want to dominate) on leashes. The crowd, one of the biggest for that time slot,… Read more »
@Not buyin it: I’m sure you know,for reasons you stated, the other side of this coin,the discussion about why some women behave as Mrs Broadwell did, won’t take place. And,of course, as you noted shit isn’t likely to change.We,as a culture, lack courage and vision. Yet, another missed opportunity.
@ogwriter
There’s no doubt the men are held to a different standard for the same indiscretions, but I believe their is a huge & detrimental difference in this case compared to for example (Tiger woods & others) in this case Sir we have to admit that it does effect the rules set for their occupations & duties I don’t know if you heard the news that his successor in Afghanistan is allegedly involved in similar indiscretions, the nature of their jobs & the risk to national security makes their behavior irresponsible & reprehensible to say the least.
@Not Buying it: Couldn’t agree more.
Anybody who thinks that Extramarital affairs between married men in power and women with their hypergamy tendencies is not occurring right now or in the future is delusional or totally unaware of human nature & evolutionary human gender psychology, the simple fact is sexual relations between consenting adults shouldn’t be anybody’s business unless it affects their job performance period.
I do understand that not having any Extramarital affairs is strongly enforced by the CIA in fact more so then the Army, Navy & Air force for a justified fear of counter espionage & a high risk of infiltration, therefore I can see way he should resign, but the point Tom is making is not that it’s more to do with the hypocrisy associated with high status alpha male’s indiscretions when it comes to infidelity & how unlike women although less in numbers to commit the same indiscretions are for the lack of better word & metaphorically speaking are asked… Read more »
The man was given a position of trust because he was believed to be trustworthy. His infidelity to the woman who trusted him most in the world is a betrayal of that trust. You are fishing for a reason to justify infidelity. Alot of politics is involved for a general to rise to the level Petraeus rose to. He was a general who said and did things the President liked and thus he was made commander of our forces in Iraq. As to whether Iraq continues to be stable remains to be seen and his success there is unconfirmed. He… Read more »
What Elizabeth said. James Bond fantasy aside, you don’t want your spooks sleeping around.
Remember when a faction of The Troops referred to him as General Betrayus, and Moveon.org got in trouble for doing the same thing? Seems like an apt nickname as far as his wife is concerned. More so if he cheated on Other Woman #1.
Me again. Just went and read the heartbreaking Trey Malone note in light of your comment. And actually, I think they are related. I think the lack of caring on the part of Amherst, the systemic corruption at Penn State, and General Petraeus and Paula Broadwell’s grandiose fantasy that became all too real are part and parcel of an arrogance of power and position that we need to beat down every time it rears its ugly head. Period. We can’t let power corrupt or we are sunk. And there is a world of difference between a human mistake and systemic… Read more »
No, Tom. Could not disagree with you more in this case. The relationship was inappropriate while they were in Afghanistan and soldiers under his command were getting killed. He was jogging and flirting, even if sex under the desk didn’t come till he was at CIA. There are so many things wrong. First, if you will cheat on your wife, who won’t you cheat on? Second, even if the first is a private issue, this was a public man, betraying our confidence as a nation. Even if you think the blackmail issue is far-fetched, I guarantee you the people around… Read more »
While I agree that a lot of journalism has become focused on celebrities and sensationalism, I don’t want to go back to a time where certain things where kept “hush, hush” because of the public accreditation someone might have earned in their life time. Hello JFK right? Who regularly cheated on Jackie and had the men that worked for him work hard to keep her occupied while he played. I think the focus on cheating men is a backlash from previous decades where it was well known and well accepted that otherwise committed men had other women on the side.… Read more »
@Erin: “I don’t want to go back to a time where certain things where kept “hush, hush” ” I agree 100%. But, there’s a huge difference between revealing uncomfortable personal secrets, and – because of those secrets – firing someone who’s done a fine job. If a – let’s say – surgeon is a cheater, IMO it has nothing to do with his ability (and job) as a surgeon. If you were to go under surgery, would you choose a mediocre but faithful surgeon, or a cheating but excellent one? Sex behaviour (as long as it’s legal) has little to… Read more »
I’m caught in the middle of that Valter. I understand what you are saying. But I also tend to think people that can’t make the right choices to respect those in their actual family and even himself (because I think he dishonored himself the most), who they love on a personal level, why would they show that code of honor and ethnics on a professional scale? If a man will do something to his own family regarding looking after his own needs first, he will certainly do it professionally too. At least, that’s how I see it. And when you… Read more »
One of your best pieces ever. You are improving as a writer. It’s slow improvement, but it’s still improvement.
Thanks Paul.
Two points: 1) The problem is less about sex and more about honor. These guys broke their promises. There is deceit involved. It is entirely valid to be concerned about the judgment of someone in a high place who systematically lies and deceives to avoid revealing a mistake. First because he’s done that, second because he is open to manipulation. 2) I question the priorities of society for paying Tiger Woods so much in the first place. He created an image that his behavior belied (again, deception). Richard Daly would have made no headlines for this. If what these men… Read more »
What riles me isn’t that these guys are having affairs, but they’re doing so at a time when they’re supposed to be leading young men and women in battle. These guys’ decisions are sending people into harms way, and possibly to death … and yet they find the free time to sneak around with a mistress, send hundreds (if not thousands) of emails to their paramours, get involved in a sketchy custody dispute and, basically, focus their effort on getting their d**** wet instead of the mission at hand.
“How much does the personal ethics of a man count towards how we judge him in the public eye?” … “On Veteran’s Day we might want to think about his service before humiliating him for consensual sex.” He dishonored himself. When you’re the head of the CIA, you simply can’t have the kind of crummy judgement he displayed by boinking his biographer. By the way, can you imagine the ego on a guy who gets involved with his biographer? A whole new meaning to “GFY.” All that is alleged to have happened took place while Petraeus was director of the… Read more »
Tom, you’ve raised some very interesting questions and you’ve made many thoughtful, valid points. You’ve given your readers much to ponder, and that’s a good thing.
One journalistic note: you buried your lede. Your last paragraph is very powerful & that’s your lede.
Hey Tom, I love courage when I see it. Kudos to you for having the balls to buck the system and speak out against the way our national press treats heterosexual men. If you’re serious about changing how men are depicted for acting on their natural (God given, if you will) instinct to be non-monogamous, you’re not going to convince anyone by demurely asking, “Can we please kill the headline “He Cheated”? Our culture’s answer to your not unreasonable plea is an unequivocal “No.” Why? Because as women showed us in the 1970’s, and gay men courageously proved over the… Read more »
I stopped reading your article when you used the male chauvinistic term, “having the balls to buck the system.”
Tom Matlock doesn’t buck the system. He supports the system because he denies that our society believes that men are superior to women.
@Richard J. Nocera: “For doing what tens of millions of normal, virile, healthy American men routinely do day in and day out.” Richard, do not forget marital infidelity is not just about men cheating; it happens to many women as well. IIRC, last statistics I read were: around 70% of men, and 50% of women, cheat at least once in their lives (in the West, at least). So the issue is not just about the men (although men are much more blamed than women about this), it’s about the myths of marriage and monogamy. Those myths are highly unnatural, contrived… Read more »
@You raise some interesting points Tom. Your folk have a great history of pacificism in America which is to be admired. I’ve studied recently the question of why men fight in wars and you should checkout the history of war proganda here and in Britian beginnings with WW1. Your query seemed to imply you may beleieve that men are perdispsoed to fightng in wars and such but your will find that this is hardly the case, as the history of you folks will attest,, at least in modern warfare. You will also find that after men found out about the… Read more »